Starting a new brand seems easy, but many struggle with the most basic step in brand development – finding your brand niche. If you’re also out there testing the waters and can’t find that sweet spot in the market, don’t worry – you’re not alone. That said, finding the right brand niche is crucial to the success of your business.
We’ve put together an easy, five-step formula you can follow to find your brand niche. Using this formula, you can focus your energies on the right areas and find the perfect niche. We also share five questions you can ask yourself to find your niche in less than an hour.
Keep reading to discover this time-tested, proven formula to identify a unique brand niche where you can find success.
Pin Down Your Skills, Interests, and Passions
Start by taking inventory of your skills, interests, and passions. What are you good at? What do you enjoy doing? What are you passionate about?
Make a list of these things, and then start to narrow it down. You don’t need to be good at everything or be interested in everything. Just focus on a few key areas. You need to start to identify what it is you want to do. You can use this Purpose Venn Diagram to determine where all these areas intersect
Don’t undermine yourself. Don’t strive to be everything to everybody by trying to do everything for everybody. It’s better to be a master at one thing and try to be a whole lot of other things than it is to be a master of nothing and try to be a whole lot of things. No one cares about quantity unless the quality is there.
You don’t always have to follow other people’s footsteps to succeed. Nobody else is exactly like you, so why would you do option “A” just because everyone else is doing it? What’s right for others may be wrong for you, so look for something that might work. Trying to jump on things and do the same things everybody else is doing, just because that’s the way everybody else is doing it, isn’t going to get you anywhere. Don’t be afraid to be a little bit different than everybody else.
You are not who you were before. All that you’ve been through and how it has changed you. All of the experiences that you currently have, your tools, resources, and network. They all contribute to where you are and who you are now. Think about how things are different and start with a clean slate.
Find Relevant Problems That Need Solutions
Once you know what you’re good at and what you’re interested in, you can start to look for relevant problems that need solutions. Have you established the need for your solution, or are you even solving the right problem?
What problems people face in your niche? What are they struggling with? Is there a pain point that your business can address?
One surefire way to remotely assess demand for your products and services is to use Google’s Keyword Planner. This tool allows you to research the number of searches for a particular keyword in your city or region. If people are actively searching for a product or service in your niche, it’s a good sign that there’s a demand for exactly what you offer.
With this research in hand, it’s time to customer segmentation. Who are your ideal customers? What do they look like? How do they spend their money? In reality, proper customer segmentation is a complex science that requires a lot of work. Take the time to dig into these species and target them in your marketing efforts accordingly.
See What Others Are Doing
Consider what other businesses are doing in your niche. See what’s working for them and what’s not. What are they doing well? What could they improve? How can you do better than them? Doing your research is essential for this step. After all, you can’t improve what you don’t know. These sneaky online tools for competitive analysis can be very helpful if you know what you’re looking for.
Alternatively, you may also get help from a business coach or marketing consultant to help you determine what marketing strategies would work well for your niche. Having an outside expert can be useful, especially if you’re stuck in a rut.
Magnify Your Niche and Hyper-Focus
Now it’s time for you to zoom in and hyper-focus on your niche. What can you do to make your niche even more specific? Being specific is always better than becoming a jack of all trades. It allows you to attract the right audience and be more successful. What kind of exactly do you want to be known as? Do you want to focus on a certain type of food? A certain type of decoration? A certain style of design?
That’s all – you just need a proof of concept at this point. Say, for example, your niche is vintage kitchen decoration. Yes, that sounds great and original. But there are lots of others saying the same thing, so you need to make the term seem even more unique. Perhaps, you could focus on French vintage kitchen decoration. This will help you attract the right audience.
Monitor, Test, and Reform
Crafting a culture that resonates with a specific audience can be a difficult proposition. However, taking the time to research, monitor, and reform your brand niche is crucial to attracting your target audience. The very first step is the research. Monitoring your brand to understand your target audience is paramount to success.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to know everyone’s name, but you should be able to identify characteristics and traits that allow you to pinpoint the people you want your brand to appeal to. Also, keep an eye on trends that might be happening within your industry. You don’t want to be perceived as a dinosaur, but you also need to make sure that you’re not changing things just for change’s sake.
Finally, you need to know when to reform your brand niche. There are a number of reasons this might be necessary, and you need to be able to recognize when it’s time. Maybe your brand has become stale, or perhaps you’ve outgrown your target audience. Whatever the reason, if you don’t reform your brand niche from time to time, you run the risk of becoming irrelevant.
Make sure you’re always looking for ways to improve and grow. By following this formula, you’ll be able to find the perfect brand niche for your business.
Questions to Find Your Brand Niche in Less than an Hour
Do you want to build a strong personal brand, establish expert status in your industry, and attract more clients and customers, but feel lost on where to start?
Finding your brand niche doesn’t have to be complicated or time-consuming. With a little soul-searching and some reflection, you can pinpoint your niche in less than an hour.
Using this simple Brand Niche Checklist, you can narrow down your niche in less than an hour, so you can build a brand that is clear, authentic, and irresistible.
What Are Your Passions And Interests?
Think about the things you love to do and the topics that you’re passionate about. What makes you jump out of bed in the morning excited to start the day? These are the things that you should be thinking about when it comes to finding your brand niche.
What Are You Good At?
We all have skills and talents that we’re naturally good at. What are yours? These are the things that you should be leveraging in your brand.
What Advice You Can Give that People Can Use?
Chances are, there are certain topics or areas that people come to you for advice on. What are those things? These are likely the topics you should be focusing on in your brand.
How Do You Want People to Remember You?
This question may hold a personal value for you, but it also accounts for the legacy you’d leave with your brand. What’s your expertise that people would know you for? What do you want people to say about you when you’re not in the room? These questions give you a perspective and also help you find a niche you can sustainably grow in.
What Are Your Values?
Values are at the core of every strong brand. What are yours? What do you stand for? These are the things that should be evident in your brand.
Answering these simple questions will give you a much clearer idea of what your brand niche should be. And remember, don’t overthink it. Your goal is to identify a niche that feels natural and authentic to you.
Conclusion
With some brainstorming and a little reflection, this easy formula to find your brand niche can do wonders. By following these simple steps, you can zero in on the perfect niche for your business. And once you’ve found it, you can start creating content and marketing strategies that will attract your ideal customer. So what are you waiting for? Get out there and start finding your niche!
